You and me amplified
by missymeggins
Summary: Kate Beckett wakes with a voice in her head. Set during 'Rise', Beckett's thought process. Castle/Beckett


_you and me amplified _| **Castle; **Kate Beckett, Castle/Beckett | 2900 | g | spoilers for _Rise_

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_You can't please somebody, can't please somebody else  
>Until you learn to look after yourself<br>You can't be somebody, can't be somebody else  
>You've learned your lesson, put in on the shelf<em>

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xx

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Kate Beckett wakes with a voice in her head.

The pain fogs things up and she's not even sure how long it takes before she can open her eyes to identify her surroundings as a hospital room but she can hear the hum of something in the back of her mind the whole time and as the world comes back to her, in all it's harsh realities, that hum finally starts to become clear.

Castle's voice; words she didn't expect. "_I love you Kate._"

They don't quite make sense to her. She can't find the context for them, the where or the how or the why. All she can comprehend is pain and blinding brightness and his voice.

She falls asleep again and when she wakes Josh is at her side, his fingers gently running over the surface of her hand. It doesn't feel right and Castle's words are still pressing at her memory.

(She tells herself it's the drugs, whatever painkillers they've got her on, and the fact that she's had a bullet rip through her body – how could anything feel the same after that? But she knows that's not all it is.)

Josh talks to her gently, asking her what she remembers and telling her about the injuries she sustained. He sounds more like her doctor than her boyfriend, but when he looks at her she sees the feeling in his eyes and she remembers how easy it was to fall for him.

She tells him she can't remember much of the shooting. She's not sure if it's because she doesn't want Josh to know what Castle said, or because she's not sure how to face it herself.

When she falls back to sleep she dreams about it though.

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xx

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(_I love you. Kate, I love you. She smiles and feels a warm glow rush through her. She can feel his breath on her neck as his fingers brush the sides of her thighs and she turns to face him - _

_- the air around her screams, the world seems drenched in green, there's something punching a hole right through her. His voice; it's too quiet, she strains to hear it. _

_Stay with me Kate.)_

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xx

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There's this moment when he walks into her hospital room and she sees him and her heart just speeds up because he's _here _and he loves her and in her dreams she can't see his face but now she can and she hadn't even realised how much she'd missed it.

(Her body betrays her brain in this moment, forcing truths to be acknowledged without doubt. Her heartbeat won't let her pretend anymore. She loves him too.)

Josh leaves and they're alone. She had hoped it would feel easier than this.

It's not deliberate. She doesn't _mean_ to lie to him. There's no forethought or premeditation but the words that spill from her lips are misleading.

"I hear that you tried to save me."

(It's simple in its truth. Her dad told her about Castle tackling her to the ground before she'd really had a chance to remember it for herself and that's all she really means when she says 'hear' but that single word steers things in a different direction. Suddenly it seems so much easier _not _to remember.)

The way he looks at her now affirms her subconscious impulse to lie. There is _too _much feeling and her brain is so crowded with the memory of Montgomery's death, the lingering obsession for justice, the chaos and heartache of the past week, she can't find the peace she needs to face him.

"They say there are some things that are better not being remembered."

As the words leave her mouth she's not even certain which part she's actually talking about. The lie means they're supposed to just be about the gunshot - and they're probably true; she'd rather she couldn't remember the fear or the sudden burst of pain that had taken over her body before she blacked out. But there's a part of which wonders if she isn't also referring to his confession.

It isn't that she doesn't want it to be true. It _means _something (it means a great many things) but it's not simple and _knowing _it isn't simple. To tell him that she remembers will mean having to face decisions she's not yet ready for.

She just needs to breathe for a little while. She'll see him again in a few days, with a clearer head.

(Time speeds up without her permission. She doesn't mean for it to become three months later, it just _does._)

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She's a coward when it comes to Josh. She's so tired and everything still hurts and even though she knows he deserves better she just can't find it in her to be anything but blunt.

"I can't do this anymore," is all she says.

He'd be angry if he weren't such a decent guy and she wasn't lying in a hospital bed. Part of her expected him to fight for her but she instead he just walks away and she can't really blame him.

And that's the end.

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xx

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When she's recovered enough to be released her dad takes her away from the hospital, away from the city, away from her life.

It seems like the right thing at first – for both of them. He needs to see her safe and healing. He needs to feel like her dad again, feel that he can protect her at least in this small way. And she doesn't want to be alone with her thoughts, doesn't want to be in her apartment with it's walls of conspiracy and ghosts.

She used to love their cabin when she was a kid. It was always so peaceful but now there's _too_ much quiet and her thoughts are loud.

It doesn't help that Jim chooses to vocalise them for her when she's trying so hard to ignore them.

"He's in love with you Katie. I don't think that's gonna go away anytime soon," he tells her one night as she's sitting on the couch, wrapped in a blanket with her arms holding her knees to her chest. (It hurts and she knows she's supposed to be more gentle with her body but she doesn't really care right now.)

He's reading the advanced copy of _Heat Rises_ that Castle's publishers sent them. She won't go near it, not even to read the dedication page. She doesn't want to think about whether there's a connection between the book and her dad's comment so she just pretends not to hear him and he leaves her alone.

The days keep ticking by and they don't really talk. She's restless but she has no desire to actually do anything or go anywhere.

She's stuck.

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xx

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"Katie," he says gently, resting a hand on her shoulder. "I thought resting here was what you needed, or maybe it was just what I needed, to feel like I could take care of you. But I think it's time you went home, start putting your life back together."

She doesn't face him and her voice shakes more than she'd like. "I'm not ready."

"Maybe not. But you won't _be _ready until you try."

He moves now and kneels in front of her where she sits on the couch, just like he used to when she was a child, and brushes the hair back from her face. "I'll be here if you need me, you know that. There's nothing I wouldn't do for you. But I think it's your friends, your partners you need now. They'll see you through the rest of this."

She doesn't know if he's right but things haven't been getting better here so she nods and whispers, "Okay."

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xx

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On her last day at the cabin she sits on the front porch soaking up the sun and reads _Heat Rises_ in a single sitting. The tears that stream down her face have very little to do with Nikki Heat.

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xx

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Kate spins her mothers ring on it's chain and breathes deeply while she waits for it to stop. When she looks up the precinct is cheering and the knot in her stomach loosens ever so slightly.

The bullpen looks different but it still _feels _like home.

The boys fill her in and when they tell her how Castle has worked the case all summer, even without her, she knows it's time to face him. She's afraid to call, or show up at his door, imagining the sounds of being hung up on or having a door slammed in her face, so she confronts him in public where, she hopes, it will be harder for him to send her away.

"You can make it out to Kate."

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xx

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It's easier than she expected to make her amends. He's angry and hurt and she doesn't blame him but she makes herself clear that she wasn't ready before and that she is now – at least in terms of getting back to work, with him by her side. Her partner.

Maybe there's something about sitting on a set of swings that makes it hard to remain bitter, or maybe he understands the allusion in her words when she tells him she can't have the kind of relationship she wants until she puts her mother's case to rest, but his anger fades and they find their sense of ease together again.

She takes strength in the fact that somehow they've survived yet another summer of absence and tension. It's a pattern she hopes they'll break one day, but for now what matters is that things are back to normal.

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xx

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There are walls. Every time she tries, there are always walls in her way and nothing seems to have changed. There are no real leads and the thought of never finding the truth fills her head with a kind of white noise that drowns everything else out. (It scares her more than she's willing to admit.)

"Everyone is gone Castle," she chokes out, barely in control of her emotions.

"Not everyone," he says quietly. "I'm here." He doesn't look at her, like he's afraid that it won't mean enough.

She brushes a hand through her hair and sits down next to him. "I'm sorry," she tells him. "That wasn't fair, I know you are. And I can't tell you how grateful I am."

He nods but his face is still tight and she guesses her silence for those three months still stings a little. (She understands, he did it to her once and it took time to fade.)

"Really," she tells him, fingers brushing his. "I need you Castle."

"I'm not going anywhere," he says, curling his fingers around hers.

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Her hands shake and her body freezes. She can't remember ever feeling so weak.

(She begins to wonders now at her ability to lie. It's not something she's ever thought of as a talent, but concealing a memory from Castle is one thing; fooling a psychologist is something else entirely. It doesn't sit well with her.)

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"You're the one who honours the victims," he tells her and when she looks at his face she sees that he really believes that. What bothers her is the realisation that it's been a long time since she's believed it herself, consumed as she's been the past few months by her own tragedies and her own need for peace.

She wasn't always like that. For most of her career she'd taken comfort in the fact that she truly _cared _about the victims. Not all cops do. Some do it because they like the puzzle, some think only in terms of prevention, or are fuelled by anger at the horrors humanity can wreak on each other and it doesn't make any of them any less proficient at their jobs, but she's seen the way families need someone to care and she'd tried to always be that person.

Castle's confidence in her is enough now to fuel her focus. Her job is to solve murders. Her purpose is to provide closure.

She just has keep remembering that.

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xx

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"I lied. Before. I remember everything," she confesses.

Sitting here isn't easy but it's necessary. She feels small in this big, dark room, not at all like a strong, capable Homicide Detective. But then, that's not _all _she is and never has been.

"Tell me about it," the doctor says.

"My partner – Castle – he tackled me to the ground. He told me he loved me."

Her words connect those two events like there was nothing in between them. She remembers the pain and his face floating above her and the sound of chaos all around her, all before he spoke those words. But those details don't really matter and she knows that.

"Are you two in a relationship?"

"No. But in so many ways it's like we are." (How vehemently she's denied this in the past, when they play acted being married to re-enact a murder and when he called her his 'work wife'. It had seemed so necessary back then to verbalise how _untrue_ it was.)

"Tell me about that."

"I see him every day. We work together. I rely on him, to be my partner, to make me laugh, to _be _there. Sometimes it feels like he knows me better than anyone else. And he keeps coming back, even when I make it really easy for him to walk away."

"Are you in love with him?" her doctor asks bluntly. It's the first time anyone's ever asked the question with such simplicity and she finds the answer comes just as simply.

"Yes."

"Have you told him."

"No."

"Why not?"

"I'm afraid."

"Of what?"

"I let it consume me again," she says stiltedly. It's not really the answer to his question and she waits for him to ask what she means but he doesn't, he just sits quietly waiting for _her_.

(This is what she hates about therapy. They're always aware when you have something you know you _need_ to face up to and they make you bare it yourself, without their usual fishing or prodding. It used to make her want to be silent just to spite them. But she's here at her own choice; she'll do the hard work.)

"My mom's case. I just... I let it take over again and I knew that it would but I did it anyway and I don't know if it's because I actually thought I could handle it this time or because he pushed or because hiding in it gives me an excuse not to take risks. Like with Josh. I kind of knew he'd never break my heart because as much as I liked him I never _loved _him in that way that makes your heart burst from just being so full. It was safe with him."

She breathes out and sits in silence for a minute, letting those words fall all around her. It's hard to hear them, because it's not who she wants to be, but there's still some kind of relief in being able to speak honestly about her life so she pushes forward.

"I'm afraid that I'll keep using her case as an excuse not to let myself commit properly. I don't want to enter a relationship being afraid. I want to be strong enough to embrace how good it could be."

The doctor looks at her directly now and puts his notepad and pen aside.

"Let me ask you something Kate. You've owned up to a lot of truths today. You're not in denial about the way recent events have taken their toll on you. I know you've been through therapy before and you're a smart woman. You're self aware. So what I want to know is, why do you think you need to be here even though you passed your evaluation?"

This question shouldn't be any harder to answer than the others but it is and she takes her time trying to explain it.

"I think I need to be here because it's too easy to become complacent."

Pause. Breathe. Relax. Tell the truth.

"He was my partner and my friend _before_ I fell in love with him - and sometimes it's too easy to think that's it's okay to settle for that. But I don't _want _to settle," she says and she can hear steadiness in her voice for the first time since she began talking.

She stretches her legs out now, planting them firmly on the ground and sits up straight with her hands flat on her knees and her eyes straight ahead.

"I want to know that one day I _will _be ready to move forward with him. I need something to hold me accountable, to help me keep moving forward. I need to figure out how to make my life about _my _life and not her death."

Doctor Burke smiles at her. "Okay then. I think we've made a good start."

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xx

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The dreams persist. Richard Castle and Kate Beckett. Intimacy and happiness. Three words; _I love you. _

But this time it's her own voice she hears saying them.


End file.
